Forum Moderators: open
Inktomi did usability testing and found that the Looksmart's descriptions
and titles provide a better user experience, consequentially they have
started using the title and description from Looksmart when a URL match is
found.
Inktomi's algorithm looks at the title and description from Looksmart along
with the title, description, keywords and body text from the URL. For most,
this process benefits the URL however it does cause some confusion with
regards to the refreshes. It is our understanding that Inktomi will continue
using the Looksmart titles and descriptions for their general web database
but revert back to the titles and descriptions for those URLs which are in
the Search/Submit program.
Best Regards,
Support
Position Technologies, Inc.
I have to say, it's a new one on me, but i am definetly getting the same at the moment, but not just on LS, also MSN, and i am guessing probably the rest of the LS partners/Ink scheme.
Caine
This is the original thread:
[webmasterworld.com...]
BTW I use Search/Submit and I still get the LS title/description!
I'd rather have control over my description.
Me too. Besides, it looks funny on MSN when the LS listing is shown in the "Web Directory Sites" listing, and then right under it in the "Web Pages" listing, my Ink listing looks just like the LS listing.
I didn't write the LS description and don't particularly like it. I'd rather have Ink list the description I paid them to list.
Lawman
For an additional $199, you can suggest "three phrases, words, concepts, products, or services you would like to include in your description. All suggestions must comply with LookSmart's Guidelines." (I'd post the URL, but they're using some hardcore dynamic UID in the URL which prevents direct browsing; just go to [looksmart.com,...] then click on the "Submit your Web site" link in the sidebar.)
It's nice to have the option to update a description, but obviously the motivation for this service is purely financial. (I'd expect Yahoo.com to follow suit shortly.)
Anyway, that's my take on it: Inktomi gets paid by us to spider & index pages, and at the same time Inktomi gets paid by LookSmart to ensure that the descriptions and titles default to their own. Inktomi wins. We sort of lose. And the end user? Hmm...good question...
I was really upset when I learned the other day that
my listing was from Looksmart. I knew simply from the wording. It's terrible. That's the biggest flaw with Looksmart in my opinion. They destroy all site descriptions.
So I called Networksolutions and spoke to a supervisor and they didn't know anything about this. He wrote something up and sent it to Inktomi tech people.
Why would anyone pay to for Inktomi search/submit when the 2 most important elements of search engine ranking was out of their hands? I certainly would not have and I would have suggested the same to all my clients.
They need to change this quick.
Anyone else have news on this?
Today I was poking around search.msn and discovered that the LS entry was listed first as usual. However, where the following Ink listing had been using the LS description, it is now using MY description. HALLELUJAH!
Has anyone else noticed this? If so when did it change. I hope it is not an anomoly.
Lawman
This has been confusing me for a while. As I'd understood it, if you had, say, an old "classic" listing in Inktomi, and then got listed in LS, you'd end up with one listing with the LS description which would ripple through all Inktomi, not just MSN. This would make LS not a good bet.
Does the above suggest that this has changed, and you'd now end up with two listings and descriptions?
And is the situation any different for PT listings and old classic listings?
I get mucho traffic from M S N. As we all know, M S N uses Ink. That's fine as long as you weren't dropped from Ink for reasons known only to Ink and to God. Therefore, to ensure an M S N listing, I paid for inclusion in LS. Then I discovered Ink's paid listing through PT.
Of course LS uses Ink's database, but it appears after their own paid listings - just like M S N. The complaint I had with Ink was their use of LS's description rather than my description. In my case, the sorry LS description appeared twice - once in the LS Web Directory section and once in the Ink influenced Web Pages Section. At least for now the Web Pages section has my own description rather that the LS description.
I wish I had the luxury of having classic Ink listings - I have none. However, I don't think LS's use of the Ink database (classic or paid) has anything to do with M S N's use of the Ink database. I think they are two separate entities using the Ink database as they see fit.
I hope this makes sense. I almost confused myself trying to explain it.
Lawman
What I'd thought had been happening previously is that my description had been replaced by the LS across the board on Inktomi, and since that was a really crappy description the site wasn't showing up anywhere.
All I can say is finally! Sites using the Inktomi
paid inclusion that are also in LS can stop getting ripped off and now have the descriptions they really wanted to show, come up for searches.
